The Guardian Project is a global collective of software developers, designers, advocates, activists and trainers who develop open source mobile security software and operating system enhancements.[1] They also create customized mobile devices to help individuals communicate more freely and protect themselves from intrusion and monitoring. The effort specifically focuses on users who live or work in high-risk situations, and who often face constant surveillance and intrusion attempts into their mobile devices and communication streams.

Founder Nathan Freitas speaking at the Unlike Us conference in 2013[2]

The Guardian Project was founded by Nathan Freitas in 2009 in Brooklyn, NY.[3][4][5] Since it was founded, the Guardian Project has developed more than a dozen mobile applications for Android and iOS with over two million downloads and hundreds of thousands of active users. It has also partnered with prominent open source software projects, activists groups, NGOs, commercial partners and news organizations to support their mobile security software capabilities.

Orbot brings the capabilities of Tor to Android. Tor uses Onion Routing to provide access to network services that may be blocked, censored or monitored, while also protecting the identity of the user requesting those resources.[8]

Orweb is a privacy enhanced web browser that supports proxies. When used with Orbot, Orweb protects against network analysis, blocks cookies, keeps no local browsing history, and disables Flash to keep the user safe.[8]

ChatSecure, formerly Gibberbot,[9] is a full featured instant messaging application integrated with the Off-the-Record encrypted chat protocol. The app is built on Google’s open-source Talk app and modified to support the Jabber XMPP protocol.[8]

A tool for having end-to-end encryptedVoIP calls. [10] This is a public testbed of the Open Secure Telephony Network (OSTN) project, with the goal of promoting the use of free, open protocols, standards and software, to power end-to-end secure voice communications on mobile devices, as well as with desktop computers.[8]

K-9 Mail is an open-source app based on Android’s built-in Email app. The project is focused on making it easy to manage multiple accounts and large volumes of email, as well supporting OpenPGP encryption using Android Privacy Guard.[8]

TextSecure, developed by Open Whisper Systems, provides a robust encrypted instant messaging and text messaging solution on Android.[8] It is intended to be used in place of the standard text messaging application.[11] TextSecure users can exchange encrypted messages, media and attachments. The application uses end-to-end encryption to secure all messages that are sent to other TextSecure users.[12][13][14]